Kashmiri Pandit Essay

SUVIDHA JANI

PROFESSOR POOJA NEGI

PRESENT

Lal Ded, a 14th century famous Kashmiri poetess composed a beautiful poem which seems apt to describe the condition of Kashmiri Pandit: “...Like water in cups of unbaked clay I run to waste, Would God I were to reach my home!” Kashmiri Pandits are in search of their ‘home’. This home has multiple meanings- physical as well as psychological.

According to Indu Kilam,”Memory (for Kashmiri Pandits) has become a lens through which they see the present and acts as a foundation stone for them to pave new ways for themselves.” Their memories help them to look at the past and construct a better future. To explain in Salman Rushdie’s words, “an endless paradox looking forward by looking back”. Their identity

Though there is a misconception about second generation migrants.It is often asserted that the second generation migrants have adapted themselves to the new environment and no longer wish to return.This is untrue. Kanika Bakshi, a Delhi University post graduate student says,”Yes I wish to go back, Kashmir was our heaven and it feels we have lost this heaven,we suffer from identity crisis.When somebody asks me where do you belong?I am always filled with doubt because I have never been there.I received my migrant certificate just three years back.There is a sense of lack of belonging.”

Many Kashmiri Pandits fear that this displacement will erase their roots and their identity.Kashmiri Pandits seems to be shrinking- their cultural and social life seems to be disintegrating.At present their dance, music, theatre and handicraft seems to be diminishing.

Writers and various organisations have worked and analysed the issue of Kashmiri Pandits over the

Though free yet they are suffocated.They are still haunted by the terror and violence they faced.Dr.K.L Chowdhary’s extensive works shows how the birth rates in falling and death rates are on a rise.

There are many critics who have traced that a classical genocide procedure has been followed in the case of Kashmiri Pandits. Ajay Chrungoo in his essay, “The Beginning of Destabilisation” finds physical cleansing, residual cleansing and administrative cleansing in the territory of Jammu and Kashmir.

Indu Kilam in her works focuses on the

“notion of ‘rootlessness’ being associated with a state of ‘normal-lessness’, loss of culture and moral breakdown. It is indeed a very complex situation where identity is continually reconstructed in various ways and is dependent upon both the present and the accessibility of memories in order to achieve an intended outcome. In fact, at times this deterritorialisation has increased the fear of identity loss among us and it has to an extent been a source of heightened awareness and consciousness about the recreation of particular traditions and cultural